BEIRUT: Speaker Nabih Berri Thursday welcomed President Michel Aoun’s categorical rejection of holding general elections under the current electoral law, saying the president’s remarks should form an incentive to lawmakers to hasten the agreement on a new law.

Meanwhile, a four-man committee of senior politicians will meet Friday to discuss the contentious electoral law. The committee is made up of the head of the FPM, Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil; Berri’s senior aide Finance Minister Ali Hasan Khalil; Nader Hariri, Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s chief of staff; and Hezbollah MP Ali Fayyad.

“The president’s speech regarding his preference of vacuum over the extension of Parliament’s term is meant to encourage all political sides on quickening the agreement over a new parliamentary electoral law,” Berri told his visitors. “This would impose on the Cabinet and all sides and on us a [mandate] to agree on an electoral law so that we do not get to a time where we are facing vacuum.”

Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea stressed that the current so-called 1960 electoral law was no longer adequate, adding that all parties should accept an alternative.

“We are all convinced that we cannot continue with the 1960 electoral law, but no one party can devise an electoral law without the others,” he said after meeting a delegation from the Progressive Socialist Party. “The PSP must be comfortable with the proposed electoral law.”

Although PSP head MP Walid Jumblatt had previously indicated his support for a new electoral law and called for a hybrid system including proportional representation, he has recently rescinded his stance.

Jumblatt Thursday rejected Aoun’s latest comments pertaining to the electoral law. “It’s illogical to say [that we should adopt] either proportional [system] or [face a] vacuum,” he said via Twitter. “There are several other options apart from the unilateral viewpoint. Dialogue is the solution, rather than isolating [others].”

During a Cabinet session Wednesday, Aoun said that he would prefer vacuum in Parliament rather than extend the legislature’s mandate.

The remarks may be seen as a move aimed at pushing rival political factions to agree on a new voting system that would replace the 1960 majoritarian system.

A source told The Daily Star that Geagea and LF-affiliated Information Minister Melhem Riachi had met Wednesday evening with Bassil and the head of Free Patriotic Movement’s parliamentary bloc MP Ibrahim Kanaan at the LF headquarters in Maarab.

The source added that they had agreed on the outline of a prospective electoral law: Elections would take place across two rounds.

A qualifying round would take place based on the small districts and applying a majoritarian system.

The winners of that round would then compete in larger districts based on a proportional system of voting.

Indicators point to an FPM-LF alliance in parliamentary elections, which is expected to all but monopolize Christian representation.

The FPM, the Amal Movement and Hezbollah have repeatedly expressed their support for a full proportional vote law. The Future Movement had expressed its desire to have a hybrid law in place.

The parliamentary term has been extended twice, in 2013 and 2014, over alleged security concerns.

Upcoming elections are scheduled for the coming June, but many fear that the polls would be postponed yet again over disagreements over the nature of the new electoral law.

Berri has repeatedly stressed that he would not tolerate another extension.

The speaker chaired a session as Parliament continued discussions into draft laws referred from last week’s marathon two-day sessions.

MPs had been discussing an agenda of 73-items which did not include the 2017 draft state budget or the issue of an electoral law, the most contentious issues.

An hour and a half into the session, Berri adjourned the meeting to Feb. 7, when lawmakers will pose questions on recently appointed ministers.

Outside, a handful of public administration contract workers demanded permanent employment and call for fairer treatment in public employment.

Separately, Prime Minister Saad Hariri departed to France on a private trip for a few days, his office said.